Lee Munson and Lorn Owen Davis provide an update on our independent fund research on Oppenheimer Rochester Municipal Funds (ORNAX).

Listening to the Oppenheimer Rochester Municipal Funds Conference Call on June 24, 2009 we got a chance to hear the thoughts of the experts on the municipal bond markets. The fund managers were extremely upbeat about the markets and the situation they were trading in. They view the municipal market as being in a far better place than 6 months ago with strong positive moves, though the past few weeks have seen weaker prices with the influx of large bond deals such as the biggest tax-exempt bond issue in over 2 months offered by Puerto Rico and the Build America bond program. All of these new issuances have been difficult for the market to absorb but the team at Oppenheimer thinks that the worst is over. A lot of these issuances have also been in the high grade sector with AAA ratings or above, which doesn’t really affect ORNAX since it focuses on high yield bonds.

Lee Eugene Munson and Lorraine Ell provide independent fund research on the Oppenheimer Rochester National Municipal Fund (ORNAX, ORMBX, ORNCX).

At the most basic level, most analysts simply lack an understanding of the Oppenheimer Rochester National Municipal Fund (ORNAX, ORMBX, ORNCX) managed by Ronald Fielding. Most analysis of ORNAX highlights parts of the portfolio without context and paints the fund as risky, not suitable for a core municipal bond portfolio. Although the short-term volatility of ORNAX is higher than the average AAA rated muni fund, over time it has produced outstanding results. To paraphrase Buffet, we would rather take a lumpy 14% than a smooth 12%, or in the case of munis, a smooth 3%.